1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a manufacturing method of a magnetic head device, to a manufacturing apparatus of a magnetic head device and to a magnetic head device. Particularly, the present invention relates to a manufacturing method and apparatus of a magnetic head device with a flying-type magnetic head slider with at least one magnetic write head element and/or at least one magnetic read head element and/or a micro-actuator, and to the magnetic head device.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are three practical variations of a flying-type magnetic head device in a magnetic disk drive apparatus, that is, a head gimbal assembly (HGA) with a suspension and a magnetic head slider attached on the suspension, a head arm assembly (HAA) with a support arm and at least one HGA attached to the support arm, and a head stack assembly (HSA) with a plurality of HAAs stacked on each other.
A typical HGA has a suspension and a magnetic head slider fixed on the suspension by a resin adhesive. Terminal pads of the magnetic head slider are electrically connected by solder with connection pads of trace conductors supported by the suspension. Thus, the magnetic head slider is fixed to the suspension by both the resin adhesive and the solder. Such structure is known by for example Japanese patent publication No. 2002-050017A.
A solder reflow method is known as for a method of electrically connecting terminal pads of a magnetic head slider and lead conductors of a suspension with each other and as for a method of detaching the magnetic head slider from the suspension in order to reuse. The solder reflow method is very popularly used for the solder connection because it is possible to provide high adhesion strength. Particularly, in the HGA process, a laser reflow method for reflowing the solder by means of a laser beam is utilized. Such laser reflow method is disclosed in for example Japanese patent publication No.2002-050017A and U.S. Pat. No. 5,828,031.
The laser reflow method disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,828,031 has a process of providing a solder ball via a capillary to place it between the terminal pad of the magnetic head slider and the lead connection pad on the suspension, and a process of supplying a laser beam through the capillary to melt the solder ball so as to make solder connection between the terminal pad and the lead connection pad.
However, according to the known laser reflow method described in Japanese patent publication No.2002-050017A and U.S. Pat. No. 5,828,031, when performing solder connections, no solder wettability in the terminal pads of the magnetic head slider and the lead connection pads of the suspension is secured causing poor reliability in soldering electrical connections between the terminal pads and the lead connection pads.
If preheating of the whole of HGA is performed in order to ensure solder wettability, the magnetic head slider particularly the slider with a giant magnetoresistive effect (GMR) element may suffer from thermal damage.
In the conventional HGA, also, since the magnetic head slider is fixed to the suspension by both resin adhesive and solder, during the solder reflowing process for attaching or detaching the slider to or from the suspension, shape change in the magnetic head slider due to the difference in thermal expansion coefficients between the resin adhesive and the magnetic head slider may occur causing deterioration in the flying performance of the slider.